Workers may never regain their appetite for measured risk in the wake of the Great Recession, new research shows.

People have always loved a sure thing. But certainty has commanded a higher premium since the Great Recession. Five years into a recoveryand with stocks having tripled from the bottomworkers overwhelmingly say they prefer investments with a guarantee to those with higher growth potential and the possibility of losing value, new research shows.

Such is the lasting impact of a dramatic market downdraft. The S&P 500 plunged 53% in 2007-2009, among the sharpest declines in history. Housing collapsed as well. Yet the S&P 500 long ago regained all the ground it had lost. Housing has been recovering as well.

Still, in an Allianz poll of workers aged 18 to 55, 78% said they preferred lower certain returns than higher returns with risk. Specifically, they chose a hypothetical product with a 4% annual return and no risk of losing money over a product with an 8% annual return and the risk of losing money in a down market. Guarantees make retirees happy .

This reluctance to embrace risk, or at least the urge to dial it way back, may be appropriate for those on the cusp of retirement. But for the vast majority of workers, reaching retirement security without the superior long-term return of stocks would prove a tall order. Asked what would prevent them from putting new cash into a retirement savings account, 40% cited fear of market uncertainty and another 22% cited todays low interest rates, suggesting that fixed income is the preferred investment of most workers. Heres what workers would do with new cash, according to Allianz:

• 39% would invest in a product that caps gains at 10% and limits losses to 10%.
• 19% would invest in a product with 3% growth potential and no risk of loss.
• 19% would invest in a savings account earning little or no interest.
• 12% would hold their extra cash and wait for the market to correct before investing.
• 11% would invest in a product with high growth potential and no protection from loss.

These results jibe with other findings in the poll, including the top two concerns of pre-retirees: fear of not being able to cover day-to-day expenses and outliving their money. These fears drive them to favor low-risk investments. One product line gaining favor is annuities. Some 41% in the poll said purchasing such an insurance product, locking in guaranteed lifetime income, was one of the smartest things they could do when they are five to 10 years away from retiring.

Lifetime income has become a hot topic. With the erosion of traditional pensions, Social Security is the only sure thing that most of todays workers have in terms of a reliable income stream that will never run out. Against this backdrop, individuals have been more open to annuities and policymakers, asset managers and financial planners have been searching for ways to build annuities into employer-sponsored defined-contribution plans.

Doing so would address what may be our biggest need in the post defined-benefits world and one that workers want badly enough to forgo the stock markets better long-run track record.

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